If you are a U.S. taxpayer who owns financial accounts overseas, or have signature authority over such accounts, the deadline for filing the FBAR (The Report of Foreign Bank and Financial Accounts) with the Treasury is tomorrow, June 30th.

Who Must File

Filing requirements apply to those who have financial accounts, or interests with aggregate balances which exceed $10,000 at any time during the calendar year. This includes U.S. citizens and U.S. residents, such as Green Card holders. Corporations, partnerships, limited liability companies, trusts, and estates may also be required to file an FBAR.

The term “financial accounts” covers a wide range of financial products

certificates of deposits, checking and savings accounts

securities and brokerage

mutual fund-type investments

commodities futures

option accounts

insurance and annuity policies with cash values

The foreign bank account reporting rules are a component of anti-money laundering laws that seek to fight financial crime, including terrorist financing, and money laundering.

How To File

FBARs can only be filed on-line by using the Financial Crimes Enforcement Network’s (FinCEN) BSA E-filing System.

Penalties

This is one deadline you don’t want to miss, as the penalties for non-filing, or even late-filing, can be severe. In fact, the penalties can potentially exceed the value of the accounts.

Generally, taxpayers need to be aware of two types of penalties for non-filing or late-filing of FBARS:

Non-Willful

Willful

A non-willful violation could be one where the taxpayer wasn’t aware of the FBAR reporting requirement. The “non-willful” taxpayer could face penalties as much as $10,000 per account.

If the taxpayer’s failure to file is determined to be willful, the penalty then jumps through the roof. In this case, the IRS is saying that the taxpayer knew or should have known about their requirement to file an FBAR. A willful violation carries a penalty of up to the greater of $100,000 or 50% of the amount of the account at the time of the violation. Criminal penalties may also apply in willful violation cases.

For example:

NO EXTENSION

Unlike tax returns, there is no extension of time available for filing the FBAR for 2014 beyond June 30, 2015.